¹⁷ And he will go on before the Lord,^(A) in the spirit and power of Elijah,^(B) to turn the hearts of the parents to their children^(C) and the disobedient to the wisdom of the righteous—to make ready a people prepared for the Lord.”^(D)

⁵ “See, I will send the prophet Elijah^(A) to you before that great and dreadful day of the Lord comes.^{(B) 6} He will turn the hearts of the parents to their children,^(C) and the hearts of the children to their parents; or else I will come and strike^(D) the land with total destruction.”^(E)

¹⁴ And if you are willing to accept it, he is the Elijah who was to come.^(A)

²⁸ You yourselves can testify that I said, ‘I am not the Messiah but am sent ahead of him.’^(A)

²¹ They asked him, “Then who are you? Are you Elijah?”^(A)

He said, “I am not.”

“Are you the Prophet?”^(B)

He answered, “No.”

²² Finally they said, “Who are you? Give us an answer to take back to those who sent us. What do you say about yourself?”

²³ John replied in the words of Isaiah the prophet, “I am the voice of one calling in the wilderness,^(C) ‘Make straight the way for the Lord.’”^[a](D)

²⁴ Now the Pharisees who had been sent ²⁵ questioned him, “Why then do you baptize if you are not the Messiah, nor Elijah, nor the Prophet?”

²⁶ “I baptize with^[b] water,”^(E) John replied, “but among you stands one you do not know. ²⁷ He is the one who comes after me,^(F) the straps of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie.”^(G)

²⁸ This all happened at Bethany on the other side of the Jordan,^(H) where John was baptizing.

John Testifies About Jesus

²⁹ The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him and said, “Look, the Lamb of God,^(I) who takes away the sin of the world!^{(J) 30} This is the one I meant when I said, ‘A man who comes after me has surpassed me because he was before me.’^(K)

¹⁸ Lord, the God of our fathers Abraham, Isaac and Israel, keep these desires and thoughts in the hearts of your people forever, and keep their hearts loyal to you.

¹¹ And they asked him, “Why do the teachers of the law say that Elijah must come first?”

¹² Jesus replied, “To be sure, Elijah does come first, and restores all things. Why then is it written that the Son of Man^(A) must suffer much^(B) and be rejected?^{(C) 13} But I tell you, Elijah has come,^(D) and they have done to him everything they wished, just as it is written about him.”